Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Sunday, February 04, 2007

The insanity of negotiating the Golan

The news last week was that Israel has been secretly negotiating with Syria over the Golan Heights. Already the MSM is starting to push for such an agreement.

This is idiocy beyond imagination.

The strategic value of the Golan cannot be undersetimated. It is not just "high ground," it is a mountain range:

The Golan not only dominates the land below, but also Lake Kinneret (Sea of Galilee):

Between 1948 and 1967, the Jews who lived on the shores of the Kinneret were shelled constantly from Syria, forcing them to spend every night in bomb shelters. Look at the Ein Gev resort:

Beautiful yes, but also extremely vulnerable.

Not only were the villages shelled, but so were the fishermen on the lake.

Some may argue that the Syria of today is not the same Syria as then. This is crazy - Syria is the conduit for 100% of Hezbollah's rockets, last summer as well as today. Syria hosts Hamas ans other major terror groups.

To pin hope on Syria's antipathy towards Islamist extremism is naive beyond belief - when has any Arab country publicly sided with Israel over any Muslim extremists?

Furthermore, the Golan is as much a part of ancient Israel as any other part of Israel. The major town on the Golan today, Katzrin, was a seat of Torah learning during Talmudic times, with the remains of synagogues still visible. Here is one originally built during Hashmonean times and later rebuilt during Byzantine rule:

Look at the top of the columns: a stylized Torah and etrog:

And on one of the walls, a menorah:

Also, the Golan was the site of a major Jewish stronghold during the Jewish Revolt against Rome with a suicidal outcome that predated Masada by a few years, at Gamla.

There is no question that the Golan is strategically and historically of supreme importance to Israel. The entire reason that Israel does not have a direct threat from Syria is because Israel controls the Golan today. So which is better: an illusory "peace" like the one with Egypt where a single bullet can turn Sinai into a forward position against Israel again, or a time-tested detente against Syria where Israel controls the high ground and from where Syria doesn't dare make a move?

The thought of giving it up to a nation that still actively supports terror is utter insanity.

"Poison balloons" redux

Like a bizarre game of telephone, the Iranian FARS "news" agency has picked up on the "poison balloon" story, added a few more lies, and presents the following:

FNA dispatches from Beirut said that the Israeli planes have so far dropped thousands of these balloons all across the woods and coastal areas in southern Lebanon.

The balloons which come in bright and child attractive colors have been observed specially in Nabatieh, Sour and the surrounding villages and, of course, in Beirut.

The balloons read such phrases as 'Happy Birthday' or 'Happy Night' in English and Hebrew.

Anyone touching or inhaling the gas escaping from the balloons will be poisoned immediately. So far a number of 9 citizens have been poisoned, some of whom are in critical conditions.

The Lebanese army has started wide investigations in this regard, while the international peace-keeping troops deployed in southern Lebanon have also voiced preparedness to examine the poisonous gas and materials contained in and on the surface of the balloons.

Delusions are but one symptom of psychosis.

Another death count update

Six more killed today in the Fatah/Hamas clashes.

Also, I had missed a few earlier murders from January:

A woman was killed in a family dispute January 22.
A woman from Gaza City was killed from a gunshot January 21, not sure who did it.
A 33-year old man from Rafah was shot and killed by those famous "unknown assailants" on the 23rd.

So our updated counts are:
284 Palestinian Arabs killed by each other since Operation Summer Rains,
73 killed in January 2007, and
79 killed so far this year.

Even Maan News, in English no less, noticed that PalArab self-deaths vastly outnumbered those claimed to be killed by Israel in January (they count 50 dead from internal fighting and ignore other murders.)

Watch out for those lethal balloons!

In the latest case of mass Arab hysteria, an Israeli newspaper's promotion involving releasing many balloons into the air has been interpreted by Arab sources as an attempt to poison the Lebanese.

Here are what the balloons look like:

Here is how Hezbollah reports on them:

In Beirut's southern suburbs, poisonous balloons with Hebrew markings, similar to the ones found in the south, have been discovered. Security forces are currently investigating the issue.

Here is what Al-Jazeera said:

Media reports and security sources revealed on Sunday that Israeli planes dumped 10 suspicious green balloons over the southern Lebanese port city of Tyre on Saturday.

Sources also said that at least eight people, who attempted to touch the “suspicious green balloons,” are suffering from nausea and dizziness and were taken to the hospital.

The coast of Tyre had been sealed off to prevent people from touching the 'suspicious balloons', believed so far to be poisonous.

The Lebanese National News Agency reported that among those who were rushed to hospital were a Lebanese staff sergeant, a recruit and An Nahar reporter Rana Jouni.

Officials at a hospital in Nabatiyeh confirmed that similar green balloons were dropped over the market-town of Nabatiyeh, 54 kilometres south of the capital.

In the original Hezbollah story, they said that one of the people hurt by these balloons was a reporter from a Lebanese newspaper!

Which goes to show the veracity and gullibility of the Arab press.

Self-death count update

PCHR counts a total of 33 killed in the Fatah/Hamas clashes since last Thursday, and one more today, so our count of Palestinian Arabs killed by each other increases to 275 killed since Summer Rains started and 70 killed so far in 2007.

Jewish shrine vandalized by Arabs. Does anyone care?

Today I visited the burial place of Shmuel HaNavi (Samuel) outside Jerusalem. The site was recognized by the Byzantines also as a holy site, with ruins outside showing where Samuel himself walked as well as a massive Byzantine church that once covered the area.

Last Friday night, the Jewish synagogue that houses the actual tomb-area was vandalized by Arabs, with much damage to both property and to holy books, and at least one Torah was apparently stolen.

The only place I saw mention of this incident was here.

Here is a picture of the damage:

The men who were there today described it to me as a "pogrom."

So we have an amazing situation where an unquestionably Jewish holy site and holy objects were desecrated and the incident barely made even the Israeli newspapers.

A single Koran can be torn and it becomes worldwide news, but a major Jewish site being vandalized is literally not worth mentioning.

One must start to wonder why this is. Is it because it is a "dog-bites-man" story? Is it because admitting that Jews have an historic claim to all of Israel is unfashionable or considered impolite?

Swastikas in American synagogues done by teenagers on a lark get much more press than than the systematic destruction of Jewish holy sites by Muslims in Israel. And I'm not only blaming the liberal press, but even Arutz Sheva barely considered this a story.

There is something very seriously wrong with this picture.

Ha-Kotel Ha-Katan (updated)

Today I had the opportunity to visit the Kotel Katan, a small part of the Western Wall that can be reached only by walking through the labyrith of streets in the Muslim Quarter. At no point did I feel unsafe walking there with my family.

There were two bored Israeli guards watching the area, and absolutely no one else was there. Since it appears that the Kotel Katan is even closer to the Kodesh K'dashim (Holy of Holies) than the main Kotel, this was surprising and puzzling to me.

Here are two shots of the Kotel Ha-Katan:

Right nearby is a small gate that leads to the Temple Mount itself, also guarded by the same guards to not allow Jews to enter. I did manage to snap a shot through the open door:

Civil war isn't what bothers PalArabs.

A very revealing insight in an op-ed in Arabic Maan News (autotranslated):

The words of the need Umm Khalil are identical to the words of journalist Ashraf the Marsh, Group in the newspaper "Jerusalem Arabi", which emphasized that what is happening now is a real tragedy and a national disaster, "not because there is internecine killings, between brothers, but because that constitutes a real threat to the Palestinian issue, whilst Israel is free to persists in the Judaization of the city of Jerusalem and building synagogues and driving local Arab citizens and is now building settlements, and exercise all forms of hooliganism and of assassination operations, and the incursions into Palestinian cities, in the time that the factions of which he of committing massacres and to engage in combat against innocent civilians who do not misdeed them in all that is happening."

There is an amazing psyche at work that regards civil war as only a secondary concern, but because Jews still manage to want to live in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria where they have lived almost continuously for millenia - that is the real problem!

Normal people would call this idea barbaric and bigoted. Normal people would be aghast at how unconcerned Palestinian Arab intelligentsia is at the fact that their own people are murdering each others by the dozens in the streets. A normal nation or tribe would place solving a civil war at the very top of their priority lists because of the value of human life.

But the world remains blind.

I'm sure it's all the Joooooz fault

I haven't been able to blog much, but as the headlines show, the PalArabs are back to their normal state of killing each other.

Given the JPost's numbers of 25 killed since Thursday, plus one killed Sunday in Beit Hanoun, our counts of PalArabs violently killed by each other has soared to 267 since Summer Rains and an astonishing 62 since the beginning of this year.

One of my dumber commenters accused me of celebrating whenever PalArabs are killed in this way. While this is categorically false, and I am not the least bit happy when innocents get killed in the crossfire or by false accusations or by gunshots at weddings and the like, I do admit to being quite satisfied when people who belong to terror groups are killing each other. So on the whole, with the exception of people like the 2-year old Bader Abu Qaraya who was killed by the bloodthirsty savages of Hamas (and is therefore called a "martyr" by Fatah), this has been a good weekend.

Hamas/Fatah resume killing each other

After a couple of weeks of barely controlled violence between them, Hamas and Fatah have gone back to their normal ways of killing each other.

Gaza - Ma'an - Renewed clashes between the rival Fatah and Hamas movements broke out in the northern Gaza Strip on Friday morning. In the last 24 hours, three Palestinians have been killed in internal fighting (one from Fatah and two from Hamas), seven injured - including two children - and fourteen Palestinians have been abducted (nine from Hamas and five from Fatah) in tit-for-tat kidnappings.

Fatah has accused the Hamas movement and its Executive Force of besieging the house of Nabil Al Jarir, an Al-Aqsa Brigades member, which is the main military wing of Fatah, in Jabalia, in the north of the Gaza. Fatah say that Executive Force members shot at him, killing him, and in addition, they abducted his aide.

This came after an explosion targeted the car of an Executive Force member last night, killing one member, Husam Abu Mteir, and injuring another five force members in the car.

The Executive Force spokesman, Islam Shahwan, told Ma'an that the explosion targeted an Executive Force patrol. He told Ma'an on Thursday night, "the explosive device was planned to target an Executive Force patrol and resulted in the serious injury of two members. At the same time, a number of bystanders including two children were also injured."

In another development, fire was shot at a car belonging to 'Ad Dawa' radio station, which is affiliated to Hamas, and two people were injured. One of the injured, Ra'ed Subuh, 22, later died.

So while I haven't been able to research all the deaths as much as normal the past few days, my PalArab violent self-death counts are now at 244 since Operation Summer Rains and 39 since the beginning of the year.

Guess who's stealing land?

Palestinian Arabs have so far been guilty, as far as I can tell, of 100% of the crimes that they routinely falsely accuse Jews of committing. This is what is known as "projection" and it happens a lot.

The latest example is that the Palestinian Muslims are stealing Palestinian Christians' land. (Sorry, Jonathan Cook, you have been proven a moron yet again.)

A number of Christian families have finally decided to break their silence and talk openly about what they describe as Muslim persecution of the Christian minority in this city.
The move comes as a result of increased attacks on Christians by Muslims over the past few months. The families said they wrote letters to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, the Vatican, Church leaders and European governments complaining about the attacks, but their appeals have fallen on deaf ears.
According to the families, many Christians have long been afraid to complain in public about the campaign of "intimidation" for fear of retaliation by their Muslim neighbors and being branded "collaborators" with Israel.
But following an increase in attacks on Christian-owned property in the city over the past few months, some Christians are no longer afraid to talk about the ultra-sensitive issue. And they are talking openly about leaving the city.
"The situation is very dangerous," said Samir Qumsiyeh, owner of the Beit Sahur-based private Al-Mahd (Nativity) TV station. "I believe that 15 years from now there will be no Christians left in Bethlehem. Then you will need a torch to find a Christian here. This is a very sad situation."
Qumsiyeh, one of the few Christians willing to speak about the harsh conditions of their community, has been the subject of numerous death threats. His house was recently attacked with fire-bombs, but no one was hurt.
Qumsiyeh said he has documented more than 160 incidents of attacks on Christians in the area in recent years.
He said a monk was recently roughed up for trying to prevent a group of Muslim men from seizing lands owned by Christians in Beit Sahur. Thieves have targeted the homes of many Christian families and a "land mafia" has succeeded in laying its hands on vast areas of land belonging to Christians, he added.
Fuad and Georgette Lama woke up one morning last September to discover that Muslims from a nearby village had fenced off their family's six-dunam plot in the Karkafa suburb south of Bethlehem. "A lawyer and an official with the Palestinian Authority just came and took our land," said 69-year-old Georgette Lama.
The couple was later approached by senior PA security officers who offered to help them kick out the intruders from the land. "We paid them $1,000 so they could help us regain our land," she said, almost in tears. "Instead of giving us back our land, they simply decided to keep it for themselves. They even destroyed all the olive trees and divided the land into small plots, apparently so that they could offer each for sale." When her 72-year-old husband, Fuad, went to the land to ask the intruders to leave, he was severely beaten and threatened with guns.
"My husband is after heart surgery and they still beat him," Georgette Lama said. "These people have no heart. We're afraid to go to our land because they will shoot at us. Ever since the beating, my husband is in a state of trauma and has difficulties talking."
The Lamas have since knocked on the doors of scores of PA officials in Bethlehem seeking their intervention, but to no avail. At one stage, they sent a letter to Abbas, who promised to launch an investigation.
"We heard that President Mahmoud Abbas is taking our case very seriously," said Georgette Lama. "But until now he hasn't done anything to help us get our land back. We are very concerned because we're not the only ones suffering from this phenomenon. Most Christians are afraid to speak, but I don't care because we have nothing more to lose."
A Christian businessman who asked not to be identified said the conditions of Christians in Bethlehem and its surroundings had deteriorated ever since the area was handed over to the PA in 1995.
"Every day we hear of another Christian family that has immigrated to the US, Canada or Latin America," he said.

Yad Vashem preparing to honor Arab hero

I've mentioned Arabs who saved Jews from the Holocaust before. Now Yad Vashem is set to honor one of them:

An Arab who saved the lives of two dozen Jews during the Holocaust is about to receive an unprecedented honour from Israel. Khaled Abdelwahhab, a wealthy Tunisian landowner, is poised to become the first Arab to be celebrated as a Righteous Gentile.

The award, presented by Yad Vashem, the Holocaust remembrance authority, is granted to non-Jews who risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust in which six million died.

More than 21,000 people have been granted the title of Righteous Among the Nations since it was established in 1963, with Oskar Schindler probably the best known. But, in spite of stories of heroism and friendship recorded by members of North Africa’s once-large Jewish community, no candidate has emerged from the Arab Muslim world.

The story of Khaled Abdelwahhab was uncovered by an American Jewish expert on Arab and Islamic politics who was researching for a book.

A survivor told Robert Satloff that Abdelwahhab had rescued 23 Jews, including her family, as they sheltered in an olive oil factory after being thrown out of their homes by German soldiers. He feared that the women were going to be put to work in a brothel and gave them sanctuary for the remaining six months of the German occupation.

Interviewed at her home in Los Angeles a few weeks before her death, Anny Boukris said that Abdelwahhab had discovered that German officers were planning to take her mother, Odette, to work in the brothel they had set up in Mahdia, on the east coast of Tunisia.

Abdelwahhab’s father was a good friend of the Boukris family, so he drove straight to the olive oil factory and told all the Jews sheltering there that their lives were in danger and that they must go with him immediately.

He settled them all at his family farm in the village of Tlelsa, 20 miles from Mahdia, and they remained there until British troops ended the German occupation in April 1943.
...
Estee Yaari, of Yad Vashem, told The Times that a file on Abdelwahhab had been opened and would be considered by a commission of experts led by a supreme court judge. “It looks as if there is enough material to move this forward and he would be the first Arab to become a Righteous Among the Nations,” she said.

Dr Satloff, executive director of the Institute for Near East studies in Washington, uncovered the story of Abdelwahhab’s heroism while working on a book that he hoped would break “the conspiracy of silence” in the Arab world surrounding the rescue of Jews during the Holocaust.

Dr Satloff, who flew to Israel to meet Yad Vashem officials yesterday, said: “These stories are only coming to light now because we haven’t looked too hard before at the Holocaust experience in Arab countries. But another reason is that Arabs who did save Jews didn’t want to be found. They are reluctant to admit that they saved Jews.”

As I wrote in October: "As with the Europeans, there were evil Arabs, indifferent Arabs and a small amount of heroic Arabs. We must not forget the good ones just as we must not forget the evil ones."

Same old same old

One of the truisms about the PalArab media is that if there is the slightest chance that Israel was involved in the death of an Arab, Israel will be blamed immediately and without any second thought.

But if there is no way to blame Israel, then the person will have died under "mysterious circumstances."

Here's a good example, where a man arrested by Hamas three days ago somehow died. Hamas says it was a heart attack.

Contrast this with this report of a PalArab girl that was said to have been shot by Israel (not only by Maan but by Western news agencies as well).

Now, who really killed her?

For the purposes of my death count, the first example is pretty clear-cut to me so I will include it, the second one is still unclear (although she was not shot) so I will not assume for now that she was a self-death. Which brings the counts up to 241 and 36.

Meanwhile, terror rocket fire continues unabated from Gaza to Israel (well, Jimmy Carter doesn't consider bombs raining from the air randomly in residential neighborhoods to be terror) with five rockets over the past day. As Maan says:

The two brigades assured in separate statements that these operations came in response to Israel's continuous aggression against the Palestinian people in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. They also vowed their continued resistance and jihad.

I wonder if the word "jihad" in this statement is the inner kind?

Blogging will be light

Sorry, but given a choice of blogging or touring the Holy Land, I gotta go with the Eretz Option.

The Elders are staying in the beautiful Jerusalem neighborhood of Bakah, which isn't touristy at all but is very charming, if a bit out of the way. So I won't have time for too much over the next couple of weeks.

Another failed anti-Israel boycott

The Socialist Party in Norway announced a boycott of Israel last year.

Since then, imports have increased by 15%.

This sort of thing seems to happen a lot.